October 26, 2006

I came across this blog entry that seems to jive with much that is going on in and through the people in my church (came across it here).

Here’s the snippet that hooked me to read the whole thing:

Living in suburbia can lead to an “out of sight, out of mind” mentality toward the poor. We’re pretty comfortable and typically pretty busy, so it’s easy to forget that our experience is not shared by many – even most – people in the world. We need to develop what Gary Haugen calls compassion permanence: the capacity to remember the needs of those who are suffering due to injustice, multi-generational poverty, disease, calamity, etc., even when they are out of our immediate sight.

Those of us who live in suburbia can sometimes feel a pang of guilt for the comfortable lives we lead in comparison to the world’s poor. While I wouldn’t want to douse any legitimate conviction of the Holy Spirit, I don’t believe the Lord wants us be motivated by guilt. Could God be calling some of us to forsake the suburban lifestyle and “incarnate” with the poor, taking up residence with those who are marginalized in our world? Absolutely. Is he calling all of us to do that? Probably not. The great majority of believers who live in suburbia are called to remain right where they are, but to develop a compassion permanence that leads us to remember the poor even though they are not immediately before our eyes day after day.

October 13, 2006

Instantly my life is changed.

She’s only 7lbs. and 49 hours old, but she’s changed my life instantly. And I didn’t quite expect it to be like this.

Even though we’ve all expected her and prepared for her, I’m floored by this immediate sense of joy and wonder and love in her arriving, in her. So small. So alive. So warm. I can’t explain it. I love her.

This is odd. I’ve not experienced these kind of feelings for another person before. Sure and new–and so instantly. Perhaps it’s the rush of seeing her for the first time, holding her for the first time, smelling her for the first time. Maybe it’s that she is the first of the next generation in both[!] our families–she’s certainly special in that way. Or, maybe it’s because she is simply sheer gift, all grace.

I think that might be it.

I love babies not just because they are cute, but because they remind that life is gift, all grace. Her soft toes, beautifully made. Her searching and widening eyes, delicately formed. Her voice–even her crying voice–wonderously tuned. All about her little body reminds that I, and her, and all others also, are made wonderfully in His image. In her smallness and weakness, in her natural neediness, she reminds of all my longings for God. And I need–I must–at at all times remember that my life, like Emma’s, is sheer gift, all grace. It’s a mystery made less a mystery.

October 11, 2006

October 10, 2006

My first chuckle of the day.

Okay. I’m not finding amusement from the frightening thought of North Korea having successfully tested a nuclear weapon. This certainly gives me the shivers. I can only imagine what it’s like in North East Asia…to be a person in South Korea, China, Japan and even in North Korea. Scary.

But, when I came across the above “front page” of a seemingly respectable American news agency (edit: to me, respectable no longer), I couldn’t help but chuckle. Why would CNN plaster a photo of a North Korean soldier throwing a pebble?

Perhaps to reflect this response to the N. Korean nuke test by the US Ambassador to the UN, John Bolton:

“This is the way North Korea typically negotiates, by threat and intimidation,” he said. “It’s worked for them before. It’s not going to work this time.” (from the CNN report here)

Is he saying the US have been intimidated by North Korean rock throwing before? (As the always philosophical Arsenio Hall would aptly put it, these are one of those things that make you go “Hmmm…”)

Or perhaps CNN is wanting to convey that the North Korean test is well…really not that threatening after all, as Bolton so boldly declares.

But isn’t it? A “rogue” nation, an underdog in the global community, flexing all of whatever might they might have (apparently, nuclear might). They just tested a nuclear weapon. That’s intimidating to me! I’m a Canadian one big ocean away from North Korea, and I’m a little scared. (But I do get a little frightened in dark rooms and big dogs too)

And all this is happening, according to Bolton, simply “because they [the N. Koreans] are not getting what they want.” Doesn’t even this sound a bit paternalistic? (There, there, you can’t always get what you want.)

I’m no expert in global politics, foreign policy, international law, blah blah blah. I’m just a regular schmo trying to make sense of this world in which I live. I’m also not an expert in media, journalism, news ethics, blah blah blah (that’s why I have a blog!). But I can’t help but think–after seeing CNN’s front page at mid-day–to continue my growing skepticism of news-tellers who want not only to tell me what’s going on, but how to think about what’s going on.

Just for fun (and to show that I have unbiased sensibilities), I browsed around to see what’s on the front page of other news agency websites:

CBS News: Much macho-er image than CNN’s. And the swirling proton and electron super-imposed on the N. Korean flag is a nice touch, eh? (But, which way are the missles going? Hmmmm….)

National Post: Now that’s a soldier who looks like he means business. Notice his weapon of choice.

And…even knowing that Big Red censors all of its news (p-r-o-p-o-g-a-n-d-a), I was still curious to know what would be on the front page of the China Daily:

Hmmmm… Headline should be: “Unusual High Heel Growth Appearing on Heads of Chinese Women” =P (Hmmm…to see the only mention of the nuke test you had to scroll down one page to see a one-liner link).

Back to the North Korean David (above), and about all this “information” we get about other people, places and countries, I think Jesus’ words to the rock throwers of his day is interestingly appropriate: “If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.”